Someday Always Comes Again
by Ladywilde
Summary: CH 2 up! Virtual 3rd Season. Highly Angsty Ben and Sophie Goodness...Justin and Sofie R&R Thanks!
1. Outside New Canaan, CA

Someday Always Comes Again

_This is virtually my take on what the third season of Carnivale should have been._

_There will be 12 chapters, in a sense forming 12 episodes if you will. _

_Disclaimer: I do not own these characters; I am just playing around and have a lot of fun in the process._

_Rated M for language, sexuality, and violence…_

_As always, reviews are great… please make me a happy girl and leave one._

**Remember that what you believe will depend very much on what you are.**

**- ****Noah Porter**

Chapter One

Outside, New Canaan

_Summary: _

_Ben comes to and finds out that all is not as if should be while Sophie learns the truth of herself. Meanwhile, a heartbroken Libby ponders a life without the man she loves._

"It's alright now, honey just lay back," came the voice, soft as butter.

He opened his eyes slowly, feeling stiff all over; he tried to sit up only to feel gentle hands on him urging him back.

"He ain't dead," he insisted as he struggled but the hands were urging him down.

"Course, he dead – saw it all with are own eyes, he's a dead as dead can be."

Slowly, he was beginning to see, the fog was lifting and Ruthie was sitting beside him.

"No, he ain't," he insisted.

He could feel it in him, in the air, there was no doubt, he had failed. The preacher was still alive.

Ruthie's expression was one of closed mouth pain. She didn't like the sound of things.

"How can that be?"

"I don't know but it just is…were the hell is Samson?"

"He stepped out a spell," Ruthie said standing and wringing her hands on her skirt.

"Ben, he was dead…already stiff and cold, he couldn't have made it…"

"Right, " Ben said as he sat up groaning with pain in his side, were the Preacher had cut him. It was red-hot agony but he gritted his teeth against it. It didn't matter – he was alive and has far as he could tell this thing wasn't over. Not by a long shot, yet how could that be, he had stabbed the son of a bitch right in his black heart. Why was he still alive?

"I sure as hell don't know any why's, Ruthie – but the bastard's still alive…now go find Samson, get him in here quick."

Ruthie looked at him a second, she swallowed hard.

"God help us, Ben Hawkins," she told him.

"Yeah, God help us," he muttered under his breath, " Now, please Ruthie – get him here, I think we are all in some serious trouble."

_(In the cornfield)_

Sophie stepped through the cornstalks, a broken woman, and one who had been shocked into brutal submission. Her eyes seeped with pain, heartache, and terror took in the fallen body of Brother Justin lying on the ground. A knife twisted to the hilt, stuck deep in his chest, piercing the center of the tree that covered his torso. She didn't understand, didn't know why but she knew that she must go to him. She knelt beside him, dragging her skirts through the dust, her breath hitched and ragged.

Sophie laid work worn hands over the body of Brother Justin, her caregiver and long absent father. She felt his stiff, lifeless body beneath her begin to tremble and come back to life. Her heart nearly exploded with happiness, joy, and triumph and yet there was agony, pain. She was embracing her destiny, her birthright. Her mother had failed – she had risen, she had saved. At last, the prophet had come home. Her life had come full circle and there was no going back.

Brother Justin gave a terrible start and cried out as his heart suddenly sprang back to life. She could feel it began to beat beneath her hands.

"Wake up, wake up father," she pleaded as his eyes snapped open, jet black and full of such intense anger, fierce savage strength, that she gave a start herself. Her body shuddered and she took her hands off him He laid back gasping for air, his eyes wild. Then he turned to her and as his eyes seized her own, a pit of cold fear began to lace itself through her, settle there and become one with the core of her being. He reached up and touched her face, his fingers iced cold. She shivered as they touched the hotness of tears that she did even realize she was shedding.

"My Sophie," he growled as he sat up, taking her frightened, tear stained face in his large hands.

"Your awake," she whispered as he kissed her full on the mouth.

He pulled back and studied her face. The pause was agony and in it doubt began to spread. As if he understood the conflict inside her, the last shreds of her innocence begin to fall away. He made the implications of what she had done quite clear.

"Your choice has been made, my Sophie…"

It sounded so final, his words, like nails being pounded into a coffin, like dirt hitting the pine box. She was being buried and in her place, someone else was being resurrected. Someone she did not know and did not fully understand.

"Yes," she whispered bitterly.

"I am in your service now," she told him.

"He wouldn't just leave me, Samson."

Samson looked away at that and then back towards Libby, standing blonde, pretty and heartbroken beyond words in front of him. Her arms curled tied around her stomach, her lovely face, tear stained. The look in her eyes was one of mature resignation.

"He must have his reasons, Lib, he'll turn up."

Libby was desperate as she started to sniffle again. Her eyes were not on Samson, they were far away, back in New Canaan.

"He can't be dead…"

Samson hoped to hell that he wasn't, Jonesy meant a lot to him, they had been through shit storms a' plenty. Now, the guy had a wife, one who really cared… he had to turn up, he couldn't be dead. Samson wanted to help but his hands were tied in the matter.

"Look, I'd send some guys back to look but we can't- that mob, those thumpers. Well, it ain't safe…:

Libby looked back at him, blinking back tears.

"I just want to bury my husband."

Samson started to reply when a frantic Ruthie ran up to him.

"Samson, come now…"

Samson looked to Libby and then to Ruthie.

"Is it Hawkins?" Samson asked worried.

Ruthie was nodding.

"I don't got time to explain, come on…"

Libby nodded for him to go but he was already hurrying after Ruthie who was hurrying back towards managements trailer.

"Oh Jonesy," Libby whispered, hugging herself tighter as the sun started to set around her. He had given her so much, given her love and strength and more courage then she ever thought herself capable of and now he was gone. She didn't know if she could bear it if he didn't come back. She loved that man and she wanted him with her and if he was alive she would do whatever it took to bring him back to her.

"This can't be…you killed him, kid"

"Yeah, well I failed, alright… he's alive now."

Samson was shocked and horrified by what this implied.

"You think he has the means to come here, to us…"

"You saw what happened that night, he was a madman, a goddamn butcher…sliced…" Ben paused, his breath heavy.

"Samson… I don't think we can say just what he wouldn't be capable of."

Samson bowed his head, digesting this news. He paced the small trailer

It was quiet as the two men struggled with their thoughts.

"Did we get Sophie back here," Ben said after a moment and Samson looked up at Ben, there was pain in his eyes.

"Fraid' not kid…and that's not all Jonesy went missing."

Ben shook his head; he seemed defeated, worn out – ready to quit. That bastard had her with him, his Sophie…he had to get her back, and she wasn't safe there.

"Well, I got to go get her, bring her back"

He muttered to himself as Samson came up to the bed, touched his arm.

"You ever think that maybe she don't want to come back?"

Ben looked at him cautiously and then nodded, " Yeah, well it's cause he got her all spelled over, she would come back, she – she has to."

Samson looked away, shaking his head.

"But I can't, we can't sit here let him come to us, I got to go back on my own. I can't risk everyone's lives…"

Samson knew that would be suicide. If Ben died then what hope did they have, did any of the world have, this thing was too big for him to go racing back there just get his fool self killed over a girl, even if that girl was Sophie.

"I never saw such… such… hate…in a man's eyes" Samson said his mind at the scene only a few scant days before were he had witnessed the Preacher's transformation, he had never seen such rage, the man's face a twisted scar of all that was evil and ugly – slashing his way through the crowd. He shuddered at the memory.

"I suppose I reckon that what the devil himself would look like…" Samson said after a moments pause.

"If he's the devil then I hate thinking what it is, I am…" Ben said softly, his voice seeped with bitter pain, torment.

"Jesus Christ," Samson said under his breath.

"I ain't him."

"Close enough, kid, " Samson said patting his arm with a combination of awe and fear. "Close enough."

Brother Justin stepped through the cornfield, crunching dead stalks under foot. His hand firmly in Sophie's as they walked towards the crowd gathered in front of his picturesque home. Standing in the front of the crowd, whispered amongst them as Brother Justin approached. Iris breathed a combined breath of relief and fear as he approached and the crowd, quickly silenced as he came towards them. His shirt hung in tattered shreds and on his chest, a hideous scar – a tattoo of a twisted tree, it's branches dead…

"Brothers, sisters…all is well," He told them in a low boom.

"You killed them," a voice shouted from the crowd and the rest of them muttered their agreement.

"No, I didn't – it was the boy, the healer… he is your culprit…"

A hush fell over them as they all felt his voice in side them, caressing them, filling them.

His words like those branches, twisting and knotting themselves inside them all.

Sophie watched as the tide of the angry mob began to turn.

Her heart was hollow inside her. Her life was his now. There was no going back now.

Yet, for a brief moment, she allowed her mind to think of Ben.

Ben…

"Go Home," Brother Justin commanded his followers. "Justice will be served…trust me," He bellowed. His hand squeezed her so tightly, there was pain but she very nearly welcomed it.

"Go Home!"

They began to break up, the crowd moving part, separating – part for him as they one by one… in pairs and in groups left till there was only Iris, standing in front of her.

"You failed," she whispered to him as she looked to Sophie standing beside him. Then she looked back at her brother.

"No, my dear…" Justin said as he released Sophie's hand and advanced on his sister, who stepped backwards instinctively as he took her face in his hands, hard enough to bruise her and leaning, placing a chaste kiss upon her brow. He looked up, smiled…

"You did," he told her as he moved past her and started towards the house.

Sophie and Iris stood each staring at the other.

"What have you done?" Iris asked softly. Sophie just stood there meeting her eyes, her stare. It was Iris who broke the moment as she turned and hurried after her brother, leaving Sophie standing there. She was exhausted, overwhelmed, her world was crashing forth around her and all she had known all that had ever mattered was gone.

She tried to take another step but couldn't…blackness had overcame her and her feet gave out as she collapsed in a heap on the still damp grass.

"Pack it up, children – we got keep moving," Samson ordered as the rest of the carnies looked on. There faces etched with exhaustion and uncertainty.

"Samson, were bone tired," Rita Sue said as she glanced towards her husband, Felix.

"Yeah, Samson…we all haven't slept a wink since …well you know."

"Hawkins is alive," Samson announced and everyone breathed a collective sigh of relief.

"Thing is – so is this preacher and guessing by what you all I saw…he is likely to be none to happy with us, get the meaning?"

They did, there faces were ash white.

"Now, I don't expect you all to stay – so this is your chance, if you want to split well I won't hold nothing ill…"  
Everyone looked from one weary face to the other; no one made a move to go.

"Alright that settles it, pack in."

One by one, they turned to go and do just that, slowly it was sinking in.

There was nowhere safe enough now to run too, the Carnivale was all they had.

It was days in which she drifted in and out of consciousness, mumbling her sleep… Iris cared for her, her niece with iron efficiency.

Justin had all but disappeared from their lives but he had left one very specific instruction that the minute Sophie came to he was to be notified. If Justin had frightened Iris before, he terrified her. He no longer seemed the adoring brother she had known and though she had always believed that he was marked for great things, the truth of his nature, gnawed at her and all she had done, her sins weighed just as heavy on her heart. When on the third day Sophie opened her eyes and looked at Iris, blinking as her eyes adjusted to the sunlight streaming in through an open window. Her heart quickened as those beautiful brown eyes came to rest on her face and she saw ever so briefly, the horror lurking underneath the confusion. There was evil there and it made Iris literary gasp out loud.

"Miss Iris," Sophie whispered, weak and disoriented.

"You fainted," Iris said as she applied a cold compress to Sophie's feverish brow.

"What – I what happened?" There was confusion in those eyes, deep sorrow and pain sp much pain.

As she struggled to sit up and get her bearing, images assaulted her and she cried out under the weight of them.

She saw her mother, coming to her in the cabin – her father/ Brother Justin what he had done to her mother and Ben – she was in Ben's arms and then Jonesy – Oh God! She had killed him and then she saw herself as if looking at someone else as she raised her father in that cornfield and brought him back to life.

Iris reached for her and Sophie whimpered and clawed at the air, seeing nothing but the past unfolding itself before her, so full of dark things and pains so deep she would never be free – no never be free.

"Sophie," Iris pleaded as she tried to get a grip on Sophie failing arms but the girl was struggling, clawing at the air and then for the briefest moments her eyes turned completely black – Iris nearly screamed but before she could, Sophie flopped back against the pillows as if the will had been wrung right out of her and laid there not moving, her breath heavy and her eyes wide with pure terror.

"I have damned everything I love," Sophie said turning her head towards Iris, who sat rigid, her hand by her throat.

Iris didn't have the strength left to pretend.

"Yes my dear," she said with the smallest of smiles. "You have."


	2. The Lovers

Chapter Two

The Lovers

Note: Sorry it took me so long to post – my previous computer hijacked this chapter but now that I have it back I will be updating regularly. Also, as in keeping with the tradition of the show, the story is quite dark and maybe a tad revolting. Just bare with me…thanks again for reading.

Ben cautiously stepped out of the trailer and into the still warm, fading sun. It streaked across the sky in intense reds and yellows. It was a beautiful night, one that should have brought him pleasure, but all he felt was pain.

A pain so deep, it felt stitched into him, into his entire being. He wanted her, he wanted Sophie but she was with him_. Him_! The enemy and he knew that she wasn't going to come back.

No, that preacher had her good and spelled over.

He saw that the carnival was starting to get under way. There was the smell of food frying somewhere and with it the sounds of children shrieking with laughter, people talking merrily amongst themselves. These were people, his people, those who worked hard and were ready to let their ills rest for at least a little while. He on the other hand didn't have that luxury. The preacher was alive and that meant his work wasn't done. He had to go back and finish the job right.

This time there would be no failing.

-----------------

Her eyes opened, fluttering into the darkness as she sat up, gasping for breath. A scream stuck in her throat, her body covered in a light film of sweat.

"Dearest…love…"

Her eyes turned towards the voice at the edge of her bed, a hand crawled up towards her and came to rest on her thigh.

The fingers, ice cold, felt like the fingers of the dead, and she willed herself to breathe.

"Help me," the words were a choked out sob, formed from fear and revulsion.

Then she saw his face in the moonlight. His eyes depthless pools of blackness and that hand came to rest on her face and she pulled away, a strangled cry on her lips.

"I will make you forever, my beautiful Sophie," his husky voice whispered as he pressed a kiss into her lips, breathing in her fear.

"Don't…please, you…"

She couldn't speak, couldn't form the words as his kiss deepened and his hands began to touch her, everywhere.

The insist fingers probing under her nightgown, touching her in her warm secret places and she was powerless, pinned beneath his bulk.

"Stop…oh' please…stop…you're…my…father…"

He pulled back and looked at her, she was paralyzed with fear beneath him and she thought, prayed that she had reached him, made him understand.

His eyes locked with hers, her body rigid, her breath heated, gasping for air, "My daughter?"

She nodded, tears streaming down her face, her heart beating against her rib cage, desperate to break free.

"P-please don't…"

She saw him smile, a slow, sinister smile that spread across his face and he leaned down and kissed her again.

"That makes it all the better, doesn't it, my love?"

She couldn't speak; a wall was coming up – a world of blackness blanketing everything in its path.

She was dying and even dead, she would live…she would live with him in his hell for all of eternity.

"P-please…" she managed to utter once more, before the darkness of his intentions overcame her and she remembered no more.

---------------------------------------

"You stop right there, missy," Rita Sue admonished loudly as she put her admirable bulk between her daughter and a whole heap of trouble.

"Momma, stop it, I am going and that is that…"

"No," Rita Sue said as she wrenched a suitcase for her daughter's hand and tossed it to the ground.

"You can't keep me here, I am a grown women and I am going after my husband."

"You're only going to get your fool self killed, girl!"

"I don't care!"

There was silence as each of them in all their stubborn glory stared down the other one.

Rita Sue changed tactics and reached for her daughter with a tender hand.

"Baby, Jonesy will come back on his own, that place why you know it ain't safe for us kind there…"

"I got to get him back," Libby said with a stubborn shake of her head, tears whelming up in her eyes.

"He will come back on his own, man is crazy about you…he'll come," Rita Sue said in a sweet voice, though she didn't think that were true. She figured Jonesy was dead. Yet, she wasn't going to say that to her little girl, not today anyway.

"He ain't dead," Libby said for she knew that no one but her believed he was still alive She turned around, sobs shaking her tiny frame and Rita Sue went and drew her into her arms and held her close.

"Course not, Baby," she soothed, rocking Libby back in forth in her arms, "Of course, he ain't."

--------------------------------------

Brother Justin sensed a storm was coming and he welcomed it, stood out under the cover of the porch and watched as the sky darkened and the wind whipped through the trees.

A smile, a cold evil smile spread across his face as he thought of what he would do…

His strength was doubled, trebled now and upstairs in a darkened bedroom slept his lover, his consort, his bride…his very own daughter. _So it truly begins_, he thought. _You can't hide from me anymore, Hawkins…_

I am stronger then you now.

"Father."

He turned at the sound of her voice. She stepped out from the front door, wrapped in a sheet.

Her face was drawn, deathly white, her eyes black onyxes of sorrow.

He went to her, took her by the arm and steered her to the front of the porch, wrapped his arm around her shoulders. The first flashes of lightening streaked across the sky and then the evitable boom of thunder. It had started to rain.

"Do you see the world out there, Sophie?"

There was no response.

"Do you see it?"

"Yes," her voice was a hollow whisper.

"It is ours… all of it, all that a stands in our way is Hawkins."

"Ben," She breathed.

"You must bring him to me…"

"You will kill him?"

"Yes."

She could feel his eyes her, their horrible death stare and she was suddenly so cold. She could still feel his seed crawling up inside her. Feel it filling her with its disease, its evil.

"You love him?" His voice was low, mocking.

"No," she whispered.

He turned her to him, roughly, seized her shoulders and bore his fingers into her tender flesh.

"It is I who you love, remember that!"

"Yes."

"If you lie to me…"

The rain began to come down harder, in a flash of lightening their eyes locked.

She leaned forward and kissed him, felt his hand snake beneath the flimsy sheet she wore and caress her roughly.

He pulled her closer, deepening the kiss.

In a window, watching behind a curtain, Iris watched them as they came together like lovers.


End file.
